Africa must ditch foreign blueprints for homegrown solutions, says Shettima

Vice-President Kashim Shettima says African countries cannot continue to rely on foreign blueprints for development.

Shettima spoke on Thursday during a symposium in Abuja to commemorate the 60th birthday of Kayode Fayemi, former governor of Ekiti state.

In his speech titled: ‘Africa in the post-idea world’, Shettima said African countries have relied on foreign institutions and ideologies that treat the continent as consumers not creators.

The vice-president said the continent should not see prosperity as a gift, but a prize to be won through responsible leadership in all facets of the society.

“It is a prize to be won. And to win, we must embrace the responsibility of leadership—not just in politics, but in policy, in business, in technology, in governance, and in shaping the narratives that define our place in the world,” he said.

Speaking further, the vice-president said the new world order does not take excuses, adding that the emergence of modern technologies have “shattered traditional barriers to knowledge”.

Shettima said answers to the problems facing the continent are no longer afar off but “they exist at our fingertips, generated in mere seconds”.

“The answers to our most complex problems are no longer elusive; they exist at our fingertips, generated in mere seconds,” he said.

“The real question is no longer what should we do? That has been answered a billion times over.

“The real question is Who will act? Who will rise above inertia and ensure that our ideas do not remain ink on paper, buried in symposiums and policy documents?

“But the post-idea world dissolves excuses. With the democratisation of knowledge, we must empower our youth to innovate in tech hubs across the continent, from Cairo, down through Nairobi, to Lagos, building unicorns without the permission of any gatekeepers. What they lack is not ideas but ecosystems—systems where policy, funding, and political will converge to scale their genius.

“This is where leadership matters. Leaders must evolve from custodians of power to architects of platforms.

“Our imagination of Africa must be one where every government ministry houses AI strategists, where continental trade policies are drafted by homegrown think tanks like Amandla Institute, not foreign consultants, and where ‘Made in Africa’ signifies not raw materials but algorithms, green tech, and cultural capital.

“We are not here to be spectators in the post-idea world. The pace of change will not pause for Africa’s historical grievances or applaud our elegies for lost time. Regret, as the opening stanza warns, writes history in the ink of ‘what if’.”

He added that the world is not waiting for Africa to catch-up and that leaders in the continent must wake up to face the reality.

“The world is not waiting for Africa to catch up. While we parse political rivalries, others parse datasets. While we litigate history, others engineer futures,” he said.

“The train of progress accelerates, yet too many of our leaders cling to old carriages.

“These are our client-state mentalities, our dependency on foreign blueprints, and our governance by hashtag activism. This is the tragedy of our time.”